IRAQ: US forces killed over 40 Iraqi rebels in raids and air strikes near Baghdad, the military said yesterday, but leading clerics from the Sunni minority accused the Americans of an "atrocity" that killed two dozen civilians.
Two US helicopter crews were killed when their aircraft was shot down during the battles on Sunday in the rural area around Latifiya and Yusufiya, south of the capital, where the military has said al-Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has been active.
The complaint from the Muslim Clerics Association, the main Sunni Arab religious grouping, came at a sensitive time as US officials wait anxiously for minority Sunni political leaders to confirm their participation in a national unity government.
Saddam Hussein, whose overthrow in the US invasion of 2003 deprived Sunnis of the power they once held over the Shia Muslim majority, refused to plead in court yesterday when read a formal charge sheet for crimes against humanity in the killing, torture or jailing of 399 Shia from the town of Dujail.
The judge entered a not guilty plea for the former president, who insisted he was still head of state.
The US military said its troops killed 41 insurgents over the preceding two days and referred to them either as "al-Qaeda associates" or "terrorists". In doing so, it announced it lost its second helicopter in the area in six weeks.
Among those killed, according to a military statement, was a man suspected in the shooting down of a helicopter on April 1st.
US military statements said several women and children were "inadvertently wounded by shrapnel" and treated on the site or evacuated, but made no mention of civilians being killed.
However, the Muslim Clerics Association, which has often been sharply critical of the occupying forces, said 25 civilians were killed in the US action.
"We hold the Iraqi government and the occupiers responsible for this brutal atrocity."
In recent weeks, US commanders have announced raids on suspected bases around Yusufiya for Sunni al-Qaeda fighters, describing some as staging areas for the sort of bomb attacks on Baghdad that killed more than 30 people on Sunday.
US officers have accused Zarqawi of trying to foment civil war and to derail Shia prime minister Nuri al-Maliki's effort to form a national unity government with Sunnis and Kurds.
Disputes over the key posts of interior, defence and oil ministers are hampering Mr Maliki, who has a week left of a month-long constitutional period to present a cabinet to parliament.
However, after hundreds of deaths, and with tens of thousands of people having fled their homes, some question whether a unity government can start to reverse a slide to civil war.
Washington is keen to see stability in order to be able to start withdrawing some of its 133,000 troops from Iraq.
Saddam Hussein stood relaxed and, on occasion, defiant in the heavily-fortified Baghdad courtroom where he is being tried with seven others for crimes against humanity.
Asked how he pleaded Saddam (69), who stood alone at first in the metal-railed dock, complained that he could not give a simple "yes or no" answer to the lengthy accusation: "I am president of Iraq by the will of the Iraqi people."
"You were, but not now," replied Judge Raouf Abdul Rahman.
He entered a "not guilty" plea on his behalf.